Garden Planning

I’m in Knoxville, Tennessee…I think that’s Zone 7a.

So – the latest info I’m using on garden planning in action I’ve gained from Jessica Sowards over at Roots and Refuge. It was on her advice, I sat down with all my seeds – organized in these bins (ALSO recommended by her), my calendar and a notebook and began planning this year’s garden.

Aside – last late fall/winter, I had grand plans about my winter garden. I was going to have vegetables all winter long. And in between the bunnies (must build protection, bunnies have multiplied) and the frost…all has been eaten or frozen through.

So this means I’m starting with blank beds.

Here’s the process.

1. Find your average last frost date for your location. Google will help you. I searched: “Average last frost date for Knoxville Tennessee.” My phone sent me to the Farmer’s Almanac, which seems t me a very good place to start. My average last spring frost is April 22.

2. Grab a seed packet and take a look at the back. Most of them have separate instructions for sowing outside and inside. FOLLOW THIS ADVICE. Don’t be like me, a chronically lazy and looking for shortcuts sort of person, who likes to follow instructions “kinda” I’ve tried to ignore said advice. DON’T DO IT! Okay So for my Eggplant for example. When to sow outside: Not recommended. That’s where I’m stopping. When to start inside: RECOMMENDED. 10 to 12 weeks before your average last frost date. Okay.

2. Find Now, I pick up my phone and look up “Average last frost date for Knoxville Tennessee.” Obviously, you do that for wherever you are and find the date. My phone sent me to the Farmer’s Almanac, which seems t me a very good place to start. My average last spring frost is April 22.

3. Now I grab my calendar and find April 22 on it. (I’m sure there’s some app that will do this, but I often prefer the low-tech way. And now I’m going to count back 12 weeks, which brings me to January 28…which means if I want to start my own eggplant, I’d better get these seeds started.

4. So I grab my notebook, write a heading, start in trays NOW and Eggplant.

5. The packet says transplant outdoors 1 to 2 weeks after the last frost, for me that’s around May 6. So I’m recording that on my calendar also.

6. I continue this process through all the seeds I think I want to grow until I have several pages that look like this.

Now I have a few things to do once I’ve got all this sorted out.

1. I need to get these seeds started. Full disclosure – I have yet to successfully start my own seeds indoors, though I’ve had some success direct sowing.

2. Plan/design what’s going where outside.


Seed Organization I store my seeds in these clear storage boxes I got from Michaels. It’s a system I adopted on the advice of Jessica Sowards from Roots and Refuge. She probably also recommended I put my seeds in little baggies or something, advice I did not heed, which is why in many cases I have random seeds floating around. So please learn from my mistakes: Put your seeds in smaller envelopes or baggies first, or at least do SOMETHING to make sure they don’t escape from their packets. But overall I love this system.